Chapter 05
Vegeta half sighed and half growled to himself as his buried his face in his hands. Shaking his head lightly,, he let them fall to the desk he was sat at and motioned at his ebony haired servant.
“Take him away, Kakarrot.”
Kakarrot put his hands and pushed the young man out the door, frowning at him as he pushed him through the door. Turning back to Vegeta he paused and waited, hands crossing in front of him as he waited.
“No more.” Vegeta spoke in barely a whisper, staring out of the window.
Taking this as his sign, Kakarrot began to speak in an attempt to comfort his King while not embarrassing him in front of his two elder brothers.
“I have to say I thought that was him for certain. I’m pretty shocked that he wasn’t real; I mean he was human of course. But not our real. Even my brothers were touched!” Kakarrot gestured over to his two brothers, Radditz and Turles, who looked unashamedly bored and didn’t appear to have been touched by anything or anyone.
“We won’t be fooled next time though! I’m going to think of some really hard questions.” Kakarrot continued, eyes lighting up in determination, until Vegeta’s hand rose, halting his speech.
“No, Kakarrot. I’m sick of it now. I will see no more young men claiming to be Torankusu.”
With this, Vegeta stood up and left the room.
***
Trunks dozed near a fire with Meetoo and other peasants ; no one noticing as Gohan continuously glanced over Goten’s shoulder nervously while he forged their travel papers.
“Hurry up with those papers, Goten!” Gohan whispered.
“Would you have leaned over Rembrant’s shoulder and told him to paint faster?”
Upon finishing his question, Goten eyed the anxious look on Gohan’s face.
“You probably would,” Goten muttered, finishing the papers and handing them over. “Watch out, they’re still wet.”
The whistle of a slowing train rang through the air, the younger of the two men standing up to wake up Trunks.
“Wake up, young man, that’s our train.”
“‘Wake up, your Highness’. We should get used to saying it Goten.” Gohan leant down and tugged on Trunks’ hair lightly. “Wake up!”
The purple haired man’s eyes sprang open and his initial shock reflexes kicked in. Fist flying out, it connected with Gohan’s nose, knocking the dark haired man onto his butt while Goten watched ruefully.
“We have a lot of work to do.”
Second later, Goten was putting his elbows to good use as he shoved his way through the crowds towards the train. Being the first on, he moved over to let on Gohan. Gohan turned around as the train began to start and reached out his hand to help Trunks up. Only to see Trunks stood on the spot, staring wide-eyed at them, not moving an inch as the train began to start moving.
“Come on, Trunks!”
Trunks stared at the elder man, the hand extended to him as a feeling of terror swept over him for a few moments, until a sharp pain shot up from his ankle. Looking down to see Meetoo, he picked the puppy up and ran for the train.
“Take my hand!” Gohan shouted.
Putting Meetoo into his hands, Trunks jumped on the train without touching him.
***
In the train, the compartment was jammed full with travellers. Balancing his suitcases precariously, Gohan sat down and carefully touched his noise, wincing at the throbbing pain.
“Do you always punch people first thing in the morning?” he whined.
“Sorry, it’s a reflex. Living in an orphanage, if someone bothers you, you automatically come up swinging.” Trunks replied, shrugging.
“I wasn’t bothering you. I was trying to wake you up!”
So tuned into the upcoming argument, neither man noticed the three black clad minions on horseback, charging down a show-covered hill towards the train
“By pulling my hair?!” Trunks yelled back.
“I was all out of dynamite!”
Gohan touched his nose again. Trunks opened the window and grabbed a handful of snow, before handing it over to Gohan.
“Put this on your nose. For heaven’s sake, you’re making such a fuss!”
In an attempt to act manly, he calmly put the snow on his nose, but cringed with the cold. Trunks smirked.
“Baby.”
An elderly woman loaded with packages came into the carriage ; Trunks immediately stood up to help her.
“Here let me,” Trunks started forward but was quickly pulled back down by Gohan and Goten.
“You’re a prince. Royalty do not help people with their luggage.” Gohan offered, Goten nodding in agreement.
Trunks shot them both a look and went back to helping the woman.
“Well he certainly has a mind of his own,” Goten commented.
“Yes, and I hate that in a guy,” Gohan replied.
Goten held Meetoo, the puppy looking completely enthralled as he tried to play with the dark spikes on Goten’s head.
Suddenly, the doors to the compartment swung open, and a large bald man strode in.
“Papers!”
Everyone rusted for their papers, Gohan confidently pulling out their papers, done beautifully in black ink. Then, he glanced at the person next to him, only to see the paper done in bright red ink. Looking over to Goten, he could see that his younger brother had seen the mistake as well.
“It’s what I hate about this government, everything in red!” he answered, a sheepish grin on his face.
Before long, the guard was stood above Gohan, arms crossed as he waited. Flashing a charming smile, Gohan handed over the papers while Goten played nervously with his hair.
“Wait here.” the guard muttered, stalking out of the compartment.
The two brothers exchanged an “oh, no” look.
Looking around, the elder of the two spotted the guards conferring with each other over the papers, until Trunks spoke.
“I’m going to stretch my legs.”
“That’s a good idea. A great idea! Stretch your legs.” he pointed in the opposite direction of the guards. “Stretch them that way.”
Trunks gave him a funny look and walked off, muttering under his breath. “I must have hit him harder than I thought.”
Gohan grabbed his backpack as soon as Trunk had left and pulled Goten out of the compartment, Meetoo snuggled up in the younger mans arms. Disappearing into the crowded train behind Trunks, making their way into the next car.
Seconds later the guards burst into the compartment ready to make an arrest, not noticing the black clad minions as they passed by behind them.
Pulling out of the compartment, the guards spotted three figures at the far end of the car. Catching up with them, the bald guard reached over and spun one of the hooded figures around.
The surprised minion let out a horrendous shriek, causing the other two minions to spin around. The guards screamed and began pushing and shoving at each other to get away from the black clad figures.
Turing back, the minions proceeded up the corridor and spotted a purple haired figure gazing out the window. The first minion grabbed him and spun him around, only to come face to face with a seriously ugly old woman. The minions screamed and reeled back in horror.
In another car, Gohan and Goten caught up with Trunks and caught him in each arm before storming further down the corridor as screeches of horror echoed from the car behind them. Stepping through the door, the three men stopped, realising with shock that there was nowhere left to run with only the engine ahead of them.
“Wait here!” shouted Gohan, who leapt up, grabbed the edge of the roof and pulled himself up on top of the train.
Trunks turned to Goten.
“Would you like to tell me what we are.”
Gohan’s head, upside down, appeared from the roof.
“Come on up!”
“Why?” Was Trunks short answer.
Goten grabbed trunks from behind and hoisted him up to Gohan, ignoring the shouting from the lavender haired youth.Gohan, not expecting the extra help form his younger brother, was knocked flying as Trunks was almost pushed up to him, both of them falling back with the younger man landing on top of him. An awkward moment passed before trunks rolled himself off and the ebony haired man gasped for breath.
“Just what do you think you’re doing?!” Trunks demanded.
“Trying to breathe.”
Seconds later, Meetoo appeared, almost flying onto the roof as Goten tossed him up to Gohan. Handing the puppy to Trunks, Gohan reached down to Goten and pulled him up.
Neither man noticed the minions watching through the window.
Goten began pulling himself up with the help of his brother, finally climbing onto the roof and not noticing as the minions hands barely missed his legs.
Breathing a sigh of relief, Trunks and Gohan suddenly let out a yell as they saw the rapidly approaching tunnel. The three men and puppy hit the deck.
The minions, now climbing up the side of the train, were suddenly plunged into darkness.
Within a few seconds, light was once again shining on the three men, who breathed yet another sigh of relief. Gohan looked to the side and saw a black clad hand reach up over the side.
“The guards!”
He caught the look Trunks gave him.
“I’ll explain later.”
Goten and Trunks followed Gohan towards the back of the train, not noticing the three minions behind them as they continued to run without looking back.
Suddenly, the train whistle rang through the air, Trunks glanced back too see their pursuers enveloped in the thick black smoke and then the tunnel behind them.
“Tunnel!”
The three men and puppy dropped to their stomachs again. As the minions walked towards their prey, they paused and froze, realising it was too late for them as they crashed into the mountain and erupted in a colourful burst of smoke.
In his cabin, Cell stared at the scene in his reliquary and let out a long, simmering growl as his well laid out plan “went up in smoke”. Continuing to glare, he watched the new scene unfold.
Trunks stood with his arms crossed, arguing with Gohan and Goten.
“Forged papers! Now, what?!”
“Now just get off the train,” Gohan replied matter of factly.
“Huh?!” Was the younger man’s reaction.
Gohan motioned that they were going to jump, Trunks shook his head slowly.
“Noooo…”
“He’s quite right Gohan, we really shouldn’t have to.” Goten began.
Gohan shoved him off the train with Meetoo and put out his hand to Trunks.
“Come on, we’ll jump together. Take my hand.”
Gohan looked towards the front end of a train and saw the railroad bridge approaching them.
“Come on!”
“No!”
With his outstretched hand, Gohan shoved Trunks off the train.
***
On the ground below, Goten had landed butt first in a pile of snow.
“Oww.”
Meetoo stumbled out of a pile of leaves, growling lightly under his breath.
A short distance away, Trunks sat up, looking around him and then below him. Gohan’s head popped up, covered in snow, eyes narrowing on the lavender haired youth. Trunks leapt up and glared down at the snow-covered man.
“You must enjoy causing me pain!” Gohan shouted.
“You shouldn’t have pushed me!”
Goten and Meetoo joined them.
“Is everyone ok?” Goten asked, looking back and forth between the two men.
“I’m fine!” Trunks replied.
“He’s fine!” Gohan started, climbing to his feet and limping away. “I may never walk right again, but he’s fine.”
